PLAN OF THE SEXUAL SYSTEM. 



By the Sexual System plants are disposed according to the num<* 

 her, proportion, and situation of the stamina and pistilla, &c. The 

 manner of their distribution will appear in the following chap- 

 ters. We shall here only speak in general of the divisions of the 

 system. 



The first general division of the whole body of vegetables is 

 into twenty -four classes ; these are again subdivided into orders, 

 the orders into genera, the genera into species, and the species 

 into varieties, where there are any worthy of note. Of these di- 

 visions, we shall treat of the three first only in this second part. 

 These more immediately respect the theory of the science than 

 the other two, which, though systematic divisions likewise, have, 

 as our author observes, a nearer relation to the practice ; and it 

 is in these also that the principal improvements in the manage- 

 ment of the science are more particularly included. 



As the classes and orders of the system will be separately 

 treated of in the following chapters, we shall conclude this in- 

 troductory one with a table, exhibiting their titles at one view, 

 in the order in which they stand in the system ; that the reader 

 may have recourse thereto, as he finds occasion*. 



own speculation, for the assistance of such as may engage in the same pursuit. 

 See his Classes Plantarum, p. 485, and Phil. Bot. p. 27- 



* Should any difficulty occur to the young student, in comprehending the Sexual 

 System of Carolus Von Linnceus, the reader is referred to Doctor Thornton's very 

 easy explanation of that admirable system, in his " Grammar of Botany," where 

 symbolical characters have been used, so that no capacity can fail of at once perfectly 

 comprehending the Sexual System, or to his more expensive and elaborate work the 

 " New Illustration of the Sexual System of Linn/eus," Folio. This last 

 work was honoured by a diamond ring presented to the Doctor, by Alexander, 

 the present emperor of Russia. 



